Clinton Recruits Kantor as Counsel to Aid in Defense

President Clinton personally recruited veteran political warrior and longtime advisor Mickey Kantor to become his personal counsel as an increasingly isolated White House struggled Saturday for an effective defense against allegations of sexual misconduct that threaten to engulf the Clinton presidency.

Kantor, a prominent Los Angeles attorney and Democratic activist, played a key role in devising the response that saved Clinton’s 1992 bid for the presidency when nightclub singer Gennifer Flowers accused the Arkansas governor of having a 12-year affair with her. And it is Kantor’s political savvy, more than his legal expertise, that will be tested now.

In the tumultuous week since independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr began investigating claims that 24-year old former intern Monica S. Lewinsky wsas involved sexually with Clinton, the White House has seen its position steadily erode. Aides, hobbled by legal concerns and unsure about the facts, have been unable to counterattack.

And, as senior administration officials noted bitterly on Saturday, efforts to persuade congressional or other prominent Democrats to speak out for Clinton have almost uniformly failed. Indeed, Clinton’s own former chief of staff Leon E. Panetta publicly suggested it might be best for Vice President Al Gore to take over if the allegations prove true.

Against this darkening background, there were these other developments:

* Lewinsky’s lawyer, William Ginsburg, said negotiations with Starr’s office are at a standstill. Ginsburg demanded “complete immunity” from prosecution before Lewinsky will cooperate with the investigation into possible perjury, obstruction of justice or other criminal wrongdoing by Clinton.

“That’s my line in the sand,” he said.

* New excerpts of Linda Tripp’s tapes of Lewinsky, released by Newsweek magazine, show the two women discussing Lewinsky’s plan to lie about her relations with Clinton, as well as pressures she was under to cover it up.

Tripp and Lewinsky also allegedly laughed about a ruse for Tripp to fake a “foot accident” and avoid having to give her own sworn testimony about Clinton’s affairs.

* Television film was unearthed showing Clinton surrounded by voters at an outdoor rally in November 1996, with a broadly smiling Lewinsky standing right in front of him and then leaning forward for a presidential embrace.

* After a seesaw debate over tactics, the White House decided not to avoid this morning’s televisison talk shows but instead to send three politically oriented aides, Rahm Emanuel, Paul Begala and Ann Lewis, before the cameras to defend the president.

The decision to bring Kantor onto the team reflected a realization by Clinton and his inner circle that events, and with them public opinion, were outrunning their efforts to protect themselves.

Not only was almost no prominent figure rising vigorously to the president’s defense, but the torrent of leaks about the nature of Clinton’s relationship with Lewinsky was so shocking that by Saturday, impeachment and forced resignation were topics of open discussion on television and elsewhere.

“There’s nobody for him,” one veteran Democratic operative said, reflecting the pervasive gloom. “Even Nixon had a few people for him at the end.”

Tacitly acknowledging the downward slide and the difficulty in arresting it, Rep. Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.) offered mild words of support for the president in a CNN television interview but added:

“When the president has not more vigorously challenged those who make these allegations but speaks in terms of legal jargon, it creates a bad situation.”

More Than Speed Hinders White House

Said a senior administration official: “We are dealing with a rapidly moving legal situation caused by an extremely aggressive independent counsel. To some extent, the press is moving this story faster that it is possible for us to respond to.”

It was not just the speed of press revelations that hampered the White House.

While his lawyers urged caution from the beginning, Clinton’s political advisors, at first, argued for prompt disclosure of all the facts--taking it for granted that Clinton, as he had so often in the past, could make his case successfully to the public.

Only gradually have some senior aides come to realize that such disclosure, at a press conference or other public forum, might not be feasible.

“The political people are catching up with the legal people about the facts, and they recognize that the facts may be such that it would be better to wait and see what develops before he goes out” in public, one senior official said later Saturday.

Bringing Kantor aboard, as Clinton did with a face-to-face appeal at the White House on Saturday, is seen by some aides as a potentially important step on the road to recovery.

The distraction of scandal does not make it any easier. “I think Mickey’s a guy that the president and the first lady have known a long time. They trust and like him on a personal level and know that he is savvy. He’s been there for the president for most of his political life,” a knowledgeable official said.

Moreover, bringing Kantor in as a personal lawyer for Clinton instead of as a White House aide helps the Clintons deal with a problem that has hampered them since the controversy erupted a week ago: Under a recent Supreme Court ruling, members of the White House staff can be compelled to reveal what they have heard from the president, even if the aides are lawyers.

Thus, at least some senior aides have been reluctant to talk candidly with Clinton or ask him detailed questions about his alleged relationship with Lewinsky for fear they might be subpoened by Starr. And Clinton’s legal team, though protected by lawyer-client privilege, lacked the political experience to advise him on that aspect of the affair.

Kantor, as a private lawyer with years of political experience, can bridge that gap.

Whether Kantor can find a rabbit in the hat again remains to be seen, but by Saturday night it appeared that the mood inside the White House was more hopeful.

The atmosphere is “more calm, more systematic than a few days ago,” an aide said, dismissing speculation that Clinton was contemplating resignation.

“We’re starting to move out,” a veteran Clinton advisor said.

“I’ve had a lot of experience with these kinds of things, and this is one of the nastiest. So there’s something to be said for experience,” the advisor said, and “I think we’re going forward now, and forward direction is a lot better.”

“No one is looking at a fatal situation, yet,” said another aide.

Talks Stalled, Lawyer for Lewinsky Says

Ginsburg, Lewinsky’s lawyer and a Los Angeles litigator who specializes in medical malpractice, said negotiations with the independent counsel’s office are stalled, though he continued to look for ways to restart the talks.

If his client does not receive “complete immunity,” he said, she will exercise her Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination if called before a federal grand jury Tuesday, as she is scheduled to do.

“The clock is ticking,” Ginsburg said. “Every day is a crucial day. But I need a promise not to prosecute. That’s my line in the sand.”

For his part, the independent counsel appeared unwilling to yield on his demand that Lewinsky submit a detailed proffer, summarizing what she is willing to say under oath before immunity is promised.

“There has been no deal,” said one person familiar with the case. “There is no meeting [scheduled]. We’re not on the same page.”

However, there was phone contact on Saturday between Starr’s deputies and Nathaniel Speights, a Washington-based lawyer who is assisting Ginsburg.

Ginsburg said Lewinsky stands by her Jan. 7 affidavit in the Paula Corbin Jones sexual harassment lawsuit against Clinton, in which she swore that she did not have a sexual relationship with the president.

“What choice do we have but to stand by the affidavit?” Ginsburg asked in an interview with the Times.

Asked how Lewinsky’s sworn statement can be reconciled with her recorded comments to Tripp about having an affair with Clinton, the lawyer said: “We have nothing else to say . . . . There’s the attorney-client privilege.”

Ginsburg said he believes Starr’s office is reticent to grant her immunity because of problems the independent counsel has had with potential prosecution witnesses in the past.

Ginsburg pointed to former Department of Justice official and Clinton confidant Webster L. Hubbell and former Whitewater real estate partner Susan McDougal, both of whom initially agreed to help Starr’s office, but in the end did not present damaging testimony against Clinton.

“Starr and his office are afraid that they will be burned thrice,” Ginsburg said. “Webb Hubbell and Susan McDougal went south, or sour, on him and did not participate. So he is concerned that he will get burned again.”

Attorney Describes Apartment Search

Ginsburg insisted Lewinsky, whom he characterized as an unsophisticated young girl emotionally shattered by what has happened to her, could not be compared with such tough and worldwise adults as Hubbell and McDougal.

Ginsburg described in detail a search and seizure of Lewinsky’s property from her Watergate apartment on Thursday. He said the search, which Lewinsky voluntarily consented to, lasted a couple of hours. Lewinsky and her mother were both present.

“The federal agents knocked on the door and the girls said, ‘Good morning,’ and they had coffee and cakes laid out,” he said. “They [the agents] were very courteous. They went room by room, and they didn’t tear anything apart.”

Taken were her computer, several dresses and at least one dark-colored pantsuit. Also seized were gifts Lewinsky allegedly had received from the president and other White House staffers, such as a T-shirt, a hat, pins and a book of Walt Whitman poetry that Clinton had inscribed to her. Ginsburg recalled that the incription said “something like ‘Best of Luck. Enjoy. President Clinton.”

“It’s not a case-breaker,” Ginsburg said of the presidential inscription.

Regarding the dresses, Ginsburg said he assumed that agents were looking for any signs of Clinton’s semen. There has been speculation that semen on Lewinsky’s clothing could be used to establish a DNA link to Clinton.

Ginsburg said he had no knowledge of any stained dresses.

“I’m not aware of it,” he said. “And if such a thing existed, you wouldn’t think my client would have had her dress cleaned after she had sex?”

The lawyer also sharply denied reports that he and Lewinsky turned down an offer of immunity from Starr’s office shortly after she was confronted with the tape-recordings at a meeting at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Arlington, Va.

“I deny that any such offer was made,” Ginsburg said.

Ginsburg said he was in Los Angeles visiting at a social club when Lewinsky telephoned him from the Ritz-Carlton on Jan. 16. He said that associates in Starr’s office verbally offered her immunity in return for her providing “information regarding sexual relations with the president and issues of perjury and so forth.”

“And,” he said, “they wanted to wire her and have her intervene in telephone calls but they do not tell me with whom. I assumed it involved the president or a member of his staff.”

He said he asked for the immunity offer to be put in writing. At that point, Ginsburg said, the prosecutors balked and complained they did not have a typewriter or a computer at the hotel.

“I told them to get some Ritz-Carlton stationary and write it down and fax it to me and I would accept the fascimile signature. They said, ‘Mr. Ginsburg, this offer is going to expire in an hour or two.’

“It was like pumpkin-time, like Cinderella.”

Ginsburg said he flew to Washington the next day and, when he met with Starr’s representatives, “they said no, the offer is off the table.”

Meanwhile, Ginsburg said Lewinsky continues to be wracked by the allegations surrounding her, and that she also feels betrayed by Linda Tripp, the friend who made the tape recordins.

“Monica’s agenda is to unruin her life, to bring it into equillibrium and balance again, and to avoid a felony conviction and avoid jail.”

Regarding Tripp, Ginsburg said: “Monica is angry. She feels betrayed. She doesn’t understand, nor do I. What did Linda Tripp get? What’s her motive?”

Kantor Has Drawn Controversy

Though Kantor was welcomed as a canny political advisor, he himself has drawn controversy in an independent counsel’s investigation of the Whitewater affair. Kantor, it turned out, was one of a handful of top aides to Clinton who arranged financial assistance for Hubbell, after the former associate attorney general resigned in April 1994 and immediately came under criminal investigation.

Others who helped Hubbell included Washington lawyer Vernon E. Jordan Jr., the president’s trusted advisor and now a figure in the Lewinsky controversy. Jordan helped Hubbell obtain more than $60,000 in 1994 from Revlon Inc., a company on whose board Jordan serves.

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Times staff writers Jack Nelson, Elizabeth Shogren, Alan C. Miller, Jane Hall and Richard T. Cooper contributed to this story.